Catching the Catcher
by Little Miss Dancer Girl
Summary: In the hospital (or wherever the heck he is), Holden falls asleep and finds himself in a mess even bigger than the one he just left. Rating may possibly go up.


**Author's Note:**

**Sorry I'm not updating my other stuff, but this idea got into my head and, well… here it is. Enjoy!**

* * *

I seriously should've started to write earlier. I hope it isn't too late.

Sorry about my pitiful penmanship. It'll probably get worse as it goes on.

Anyway, to the topic at hand:

It's been a week since he showed up in room 224. None of the docs came by to check on him, and nobody's asked about him or came to visit. I don't know the guy's name, and I don't know how he got here. He's been unconscious the whole time. He looks fine (as a matter of fact, he looks rather good), and under his left arm there's some sort of journal. I don't want to snoop and read it without his permission, so I've decided to wait and ask him when he wakes up. Well, if he wakes up.

He must've come from some fancy event, because he's wearing nice dress pants and shoes, along with a sweater vest over a button-up shirt.

I feel like such a creep watching over him like this, but there isn't anybody else who seems to know he's here. I guess I'm all he's got.

It's 2:30 now, and I'm sure I'm needed downstairs, so I'll close for the day.

Kayla

* * *

Well, that was lovely.

You know when you wake up from a real long nap and you don't feel like doing anything? For Chrissake, I feel like that tenfold. It must've been a day, because the clock gives me an earlier time than when I passed out yesterday.

Don't feel like writing. I wanna get up and do something, goddammit.

HC

* * *

Kayla walked alongside Dr. Wilson, peering into rooms as they went. She couldn't get rid of the awful feeling in her gut about the boy upstairs.

"Well, we've done all we can for now, Kayla. Thanks so much for your help," Wilson said to her, shaking her hand and patting her back before he walked into a room to oversee a procedure.

Without much else to do, Kayla went and sat in the lobby. She didn't need to catch a train today; she was staying in a penthouse on the Lower East side while her aunt was in London. She didn't need to be home for hours.

She didn't take notice when the boy from upstairs inconspicuously approached the front desk, looking dazed.

The boy no longer recognized this building. It still had the same corridor structure, and the rooms were at the same spots and were still the same size, but all the lights and beeping machines were like something out of _1984_. It was as if in his sleep he went to another planet.

He needed to figure out where in God's name he was, and fast. Phoebe or D.B. might be looking for him.

"Excuse me, but do you have any records regarding a boy named Holden Caulfield?" he asked the receptionist, saving the suave for the bar later (hopefully).

That's when Kayla looked up. The boy's voice was deep and cool, and even if he didn't mean it, it was very sexy. Very suave.

The receptionist pursed her lips and muttered, "Just lemme check."

The boy was starting to think her phony. You don't just put your hand on a box and look at another box, expecting to find records. You read a record book. He turned his journal around in his grip at the thought. _Stupid._

"Well, the name isn't in the database…" she said, looking at him disapprovingly.

He refused to take that. "Aw, that's just phony. You have a record book?"

Realization seemed to creep into the receptionist's gaze, but was instantly suppressed. "There are only old records in that thing, hun."

"I'm not looking for myself; I'm looking for stuff on a friend of mine."

"And he's over fifty years of age?" She said it more like a statement rather than a question.

"Uh, yeah. He was an ol' teacher 'o' mine," he told her, a little more nervous than before.

With that, the receptionist got up and pulled a dusty old book from a nearby file cabinet. "Here are all the records from before 1960."

The boy looked at her funny, as if she told him a bad joke, but he opened the book anyway. He flipped to the name Caulfield, Holden. It was there, written as clear as day. He was here from May third to May thirteenth, 1949, but was supposed to stay until the seventeenth. Weird. He never left the place.

The receptionist looked over at it. "It seems he was here for some sort of psychiatric issue," she murmured. "My dad's mentor was his doc."

Now that creeped him out, seeing as the woman must've been in her sixties, at least.

Kayla thought he was looking a little too confused, so she got up and attempted to cover for him. "Oh, there you are, Johnny! I thought we were meeting at the pizza place, though. You didn't have to pick me up right from work," she said cheerily, taking him by the shoulders and whisking him off before anybody realized he had no clue of who she was. "You're such a sweetheart!"

The second they were out of eyeshot, the boy glared at her. "What the hell did you—who are you? Where am… whadaya want?"

"Look, people were starting to think you were crazy back there. I just covered for you and saved your sorry butt, 'kay?"

"Well, can ya at least tell me where I am?"

Recalling his earlier questions, she answered each one. "I'm Kayla Jennings, you're in Manhattan, and I don't want anything. Actually, scratch that; I wanna help you."

"Whoa—wait, why?"

"You just appeared in that room last week, outta nowhere," she tried to explain, lowing her voice like she was sharing a secret. "Nobody seemed to know you were there, so I took it upon myself to look after you."

"You a doctor?"

"An intern. I work part-time. I'm not old enough to even go to college, much less work as a full-blown doctor."

"You look like you're twenty."

"I'm sixteen, one, and two, med school takes at least five years. The youngest a full doctor can be is twenty-three or something."

The boy let out an 'oh'. He then stuck out his hand. "Holden, Holden Caulfield. I'm sixteen too."

They shook hands.

"You say this is Manhattan? Not possible," Holden murmured, taking in their surroundings.

"Yeah, why is that crazy to you?"

"Last I checked, buildings didn't light up," he said, pointing over to a Broadway sign. _Billy Elliot_ and _Newsies_ were up in big, flashing letters along the side of the building just over the entrance, embellished with old-fashioned incandescent bulbs.

"It's 2013; anything can happen," Kayla sighed, as if it was a saying she'd heard too much. Then the meaning of the words hit him.

"But it's 1949!"

Kayla looked at him, her expression unreadable. "Last I checked, today is August fourth, 2013."

Goddammit.


End file.
